The J. Willis Hurst Internal Medicine Residency Program has named two first-year residents, Daniel Rzewnicki , MD (mentor Siva Bhavani) and Nancy Wareing, MD, (mentor Nadine Rouphael), as well as one third-year resident, Anamaria Dragan, MD (mentor Rebecca Levit), as the three 2024 recipients of the “Stimulating Access to Research in Residency” (StARR) grant. Emory was initially selected to receive the highly competitive StARR award in 2018. The initiative was created by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) to address a nationwide shortage of physician scientists. Professor of medicine Igho Ofotokun, MD, and professor of medicine Nadine Rouphael, MD in the Division of Infectious Diseases serve as co-directors of the program.
Anamaria Dragan, MD, has a strong passion for integrating scientific principles with clinical practice, particularly in cardiovascular medicine. She became especially interested in applying principles of hemodynamics to complex clinical problems in the cardiac intensive care unit. She currently is focused on studying how the cardiac lymphatic system affects cardiac allograft vasculopathy, a type of heart transplant rejection. Through the StARR program, she looks forward to advancing her research with dedicated support and mentorship. In addition to her goals within the StARR program, Dragan intends to enter a cardiovascular fellowship program with a specialization in advanced heart failure.
“Participating in the StARR program offers a unique opportunity to develop my research skills and dedicate time to a longitudinal project to deepen our understanding of transplant rejection,” Dragan remarks. “With exceptional mentorship and strong connections, I hope to further my career as a physician scientist.”
Nancy Wareing, MD, attributes her passion for clinically informed research to her mentors throughout her years of medical education who encouraged her to focus her scientific curiosity on meaningful questions that have the potential to transform our understanding of disease. Her motivation became further ignited when she began caring for individuals living with rheumatologic conditions as a medical student. During her MD/PhD training, Wareing spent four years building a thesis describing new mechanisms in scleroderma, a rare but potentially devastating disease.
Prior to starting medical school at Emory University School of Medicine, Daniel Rzewnicki, MD, worked in clinical research, completed his master’s degree in public health, and interned for the population health division of a health insurance provider, and it was the combination of these experiences that inspired him to pursue research opportunities at the intersection of clinical research, informatics, and quality improvement. To that end, he will use his time in the StARR program to study sepsis phenotypes and their differential responses to treatment with the goal of improving sepsis outcomes through personalized medicine approaches.
Dr. Rzewnicki is planning to pursue fellowship training in pulmonary and critical care, and feels that the StARR program will allow him to build on his foundational research skills and develop independence as an investigator. “By providing time, mentorship, and educational opportunities, the StARR grant will allow me to complete a more substantial project than I otherwise could and will position me well to succeed in fellowship and beyond.”
The StARR program’s approach includes a structured research-training program that offers in-depth training in the fundamentals of clinical and translational research, as well as an Emory R38 specific mentoring program that is tailored to the training needs of resident physicians.
The program’s preceptors have mentoring experience and federally-funded research projects in the program’s target areas, including transmission, prevention, basic and applied immunology and microbiology, end-organ complications, disease management, therapeutics, pharmacology, and vaccinology.
Click here to learn more about the StARR program. Information regarding the 2025 StARR program application process will be available soon.
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